Labor Day 2020

This day, dedicated to working, is important.  It is a celebration of effort to make our human world work.  I am retired.  Have been since March 1, 2006.  And I enjoy it. 

These days, I celebrate it for the people who work now and make my life easier.  The people at stores, the people who keep the electricity and internet working, the farmers who grow the things I eat, the people who make the clothes I wear and the appliances I use.  The people who do things I don't even know they do...

So today is a good day to review my own working career.  Read it if you wish, don't if it seems boring and routine.  Some of it is certainly more exciting than other parts.

To start, let's just say that, as The Eldest Child, I got assigned work early in life.  Trash removal, dishwashing, weeding the garden, etc.  I did advance to kitchen helper at 10 (a duty I enjoyed).

From there came mowing the lawn.  That was actually too early, but apparently Dad hated doing it.  The handlebar of the mower was about as tall as I was.  I mowed the lawn for 6 years until I went to college.  But mowing was something I did know how to do even if it was difficult.

So my first paying job was mowing some neighbors' lawns.  After that, I worked at a gas station each Summer.  Below minimum wage of $1.25/hr.  The owner said it was justified because the cash register was always a bit short (never mind that he took money out and put it in his pocket.  But it was a paying job, and I still know how to clean a windshield properly.

The next Summer, I took my experience mowing lawns to a job mowing an Army Base.  Talk about "endless grass"!  8 hours in Summer heat.  I always thought i was going to die by the end of the day.  But I didn't and that was a good lesson.  And at 16 I was also working a Saturday and Sunday newspaper delivery with a neighbor friend.  Sunday was night work and I learned to keep odd hours as a result.

When I got out of High School, I took a Govt test for jobs for Summer work in an office.  The local Naval Base was transferring old paper records of retired naval personnel to microfishe and 6 of us had to go through a folder at a time, organize it by date, and remove everything older than some year I forget now.  The removed files were reviewed by the Office Manager (he had a Naval rank, but I've never been able to remember any military ranks). 

He met with us individually once a week for accuracy ratings and suggestions.  After a few weeks, he showed me the group chart.  He said he was showing it to me because I had the highest productivity and greatest accuracy of the group.  Not by just "a little", I was almost off his chart.  And because he wanted me back the next Summer.  And he suggested I had a talent for administrative work and might want to consider that for my future.

But I went off to college.  I wasn't all that interested, but my parents assumed it and I wasn't about to argue against getting out on my own a bit.  Classes came in 2 kinds.  Stuff I easily understand and stuff I couldn't figure out,  And it was 1968 to 1972  and I became very politically active.  Let's just say I took some courses that were easy for me and learned some stuff, but failed at some rquired ones and left.

So I spent a few years in department stores.  Worked my way up to being in charge of 1/4 of one and realized I was going nowhere.  The difference between being a floor clerk at minimum wage and "1/4 store manager" was 25 cents per hour. 

A friend suggested the US Government "Professional and Administrative Career Exam and I took it.  Scored in the 100th percentile in all 5 categories.  I got an offer from 1 Federal Agency (General Services Administration).  One was based on knowing Fortran 4 and COBOL programming languages (saw no future in computers, LOL!).  One was based on my SAT math skills in the Finance Office  (sorry, but skills at geometry and solving simultaneous equation doe NOT mean you are good with a caclulator and an accounting sheet).  The last was a more general administrative support office. 

I went there.  General stuff is more my forte.  Jack of all trades, Master of none; that's me.  I fit right in.  I went from Temporary Hire to Permanent in 4 weeks.  We kept track of furniture and office equipment.  As with my Naval Base job, I was outstanding at it.  The office kept track of GSA stuff, but also Presidential Committees and Committees and Senate and Congressional Offices. 

I was quickly assigned the latter inventories.  And then we gained Pennsylvannia as part of out "Region".  The Congressional inventories were all crap.  I spent 6 months conducting furniture and equipment inventories in PA and then tracing all the purchases and transfers from the earliest records.  When I was done, we had a clean inventory of all Government furniture and equipment.  I got an award.

After that, I was competed for in various office.  I stayed where I was, but changed to Fleet Management, Space Management, and finally Telecommunication Management as a GS-12.  But I couldn't advance beyond that there.

I would have had to become "Management".  And quite frankly, I'm not good at it.  I hate to tell other people what to do.  As a self-starter, I tend to think you either know what you should be doing, or you are just incompetent.  And I only met one "Manager" in my career who was actually good at "management".  I am a strong proponent of 'The Peter Principle'.  Most Managers are people who are no longer productive, but can transmit orders from above...  I still routinely read 'Dilbert' for reminders of basic management stupidity.

I had to move to a new office with a higher non-management pay-grade to get a promotion. Fortunately, most of my suoervisors left me alone to do my work.  I benefited, they benefited, the agency benefited.  I basically saved the agency $1-2 million a year. 

And that's not mentioning being the Team Leader for White House inventories for 2 years.  At GSA, we had one 50character code for executive desks.  The White House is full of them, and wanted differentiation.  So I created a 6 digit code complete with pictoral examples of the differences.

My last job was to manage voice telecommunications costs.  We got digital records from our vendor, but they were unreadable (proprietary).  It took 6 months, but I learned how to read the data.  Databases are weird.  The useful data can be divided in many ways, usually punctuation or spacing.

The vendor was pissed.  The agency contractor was impressed (they hadn't figured it out).

I told management that I would be retiring in March 2006 (the first day eligible).   I told them about 3 regional employees who were qualified and willing to take over my job, but they didn't want to offend a Regional Office. 

So we interviewed newbies. None were qualified, but one did have some computer skills and a customer-friendly attitude.  I taught her everything I knew for 6 months.  But she was mostly just a clerk. 

After I left, a co-worker emailed me to say the entire program had fallen apart.  The new hire had immediately moved to an IT support position, and Management had eventually assigned 3 full time people to do what I had done and they all said it was "impossible".

So I leave off today saying that I was a "worker" and never "management" when I could avoid it all the useful days of my working life.  I worked hard at mowing the grass on my first days and I never ordered other people around after that.

So, Happy Labor Day to all...

MANY ODD THINGS

Sometimes, a few days are just odd stuff:

1.  Got a first cucumber.  Mmm, good!
2.  First tomato fruit on the vine.  I planted late because I kept waiting for the rain to stop.  It hasn't yet.
3.  The flat Italian beans are finally coming in.  I have some every day.
4.  Watched a hornet catch some bug and eat it.  I made sure not to bother it.
5.  Found a dead possum in the backyard.  I put it in the drainage easement (wearing heavy rubber gloves).  There, it will decay fast and produce no smell as the water carries everything away. 
6.  Finally figured out the new car "Auto Stop&Start".  The description from the dealer was useless.  Finally looked it up in the manual.  Obvious.  Could have saved 3 months of annoyance.
7.  Figured out the cruise control, too.  The buttons to push made sense after looking at the manual, but icons are never clear UNTIL you see what the designer meant by it. 
8.  Have to call the bank.  They ordered checks for me at "no charge" and charged me.  I called in August and they agreed to issue a credit.  And they ordered new checks because there was an error in my name.  The new checks arrived perfectly, and the statement showed the credit.  But then they charged me for the new checks.  So, another call to fix that.
9.  I called a tech support place for help in getting my AOL email to my Apple email (much easier to use).  It cost #9.95 but "OK, they fixed it".  But the credit card statement had another 6 charges of $0.10 each for a bunch of "charities.  I issued a complaint to my credit card company.  They probably wondered why I bothered about 6 $0.10 charges.  Well, the charges would have continued.  And the credit card company had to do all the work resolving the issue. 
10.  My new Subaru came with an oddly small towing hitch.  1.25" coupler bar.  I ordered larger parts to adapt from Amazon.  Then realized it didn't matter.  The towing capacity is only that of the weakest part.  Amazon let me return them for free.  I love Amazon!
11.  Black-eyed Susans are taking over spots in my yard.  It started with a volunteer  10 years ago.  They have been finding places they like better ever since.  And since they bloom all Summer, I'm spreading them to let them find more places they like..
12.  Same with purple coneflowers.  They don't spread as quickly, but they do spread.  A yardful of yellow Black-Eyed-Susans and Purple Coneflowers wouldn't be the worst thing (and I have other perrenials.
13.  The Washington National baseball team is driving me crazy.  They won The World Series last year, but can't win a game this year.  They are the 2nd worst team.  They either win by like 12-2 or lose 5-4. 
14.  The basement heat pump has a tube to the laundry tub for pumping out collected water.  Heat pumps are also de-humidifiers.  Various things can go wrong.  The collection reservoir can get blocked with algae, the pan in the inside can get tilted over time and spill into the bottom (caused water to seep out at floor level.  I got overflow 2 weeks ago.  I cleared the tube with stiff wire, added a bit of bleach to the reservoir,  and laid down old towels to absorb the floor seepage.  It worked.
15.  If the rain doesn't stop for a few days, I am going to go quite mad.  The oil squishes everywhere I walk.  The grass lawn loves it!  And do the weeds everywhere.  And the Asian Tiger Mosquitos!!! 
16.  I really have to solve the chair problem.  The old one has a back to short to support my head, te new one doesn't allow me to cross my feet so the cats have "The Lap".  A big recliner I bought falls forward so much I slide off it.  I need to turn the big one over and limit its forward movement.  It's a great chair otherwise. 

There is more, but I have to stop somewhere...

Civilazation 2 Game

Well, I've gone and done it now!  I found a way to play the old 32-bit Civ 2 Microsoft game on my modern Mac.  Addictive to me as ever.  I LOVE this game.

The World I've explored.  My Part of The World (the gridline places).

 I won a couple nights ago.  I built a spaceship and landed it on Alpha Centuri while the other 3 Civilizations (English, German, and Mongol) tried to join to kill me.  First time I had played in almost a year.  Now I have to try the next level up (where the AI begins to cheat to make things harder).  But I needed one good win to get used to the game again.

Each game takes about 40-100 hours to play.  And I win about 50% of the time.  I say the game "cheats", because it builds military units and city advances faster than it should.  That isn't a complaint; that's just how the game makes things harder as you advance.

When I used to play it obsessively a decade ago, I won 1 game of the 4 I tried at the top level.  I want to get back to that.

It's a detailed game.   If your people become unhappy, that city goes into anarchy and your Government  falls.  But if you build a Temple to make them happy, you are not building a Marketplace to gain gold or a military unit (and there are many from Warrior to Armored Vehicles and Stealth Bombers).  Tech advances go from spears to Nuclear Weapons.  And there are Wonders Of The World to build that provide some advantage to all or some cities. 

The levels are Chief, Warlord, King, Emporer, and Deity (or something like that).  So I won at Warlord.  Next is King.  You have to adjust some strategies at each level because what works best at one level doesn't work best at the next.

It is altogether complicated.  Well, that's why I play it.

I guess I will start a new game at the next level next week. 

Spring Rolls And Stir Fry

I love egg rolls and stir fries.  The stir fry is fairly easy if yu make sure to have everything prepared before you start cooking.    A co-worker of my Dad once said "cook til crisp".  It s easy to overcook the veggies in a stir fry.

The eggrolls are trickier.  Actually, I make Spring Rolls.  If I understand it correctly, Spring Rolls have meat,  Eggrolls don't.  I  buy baby Bok Choy mostly for the leaves.  They make a good start for holding the contents.  But spinach works and even green leaf lettuce.

I usually make a mix of roughly-chopped shrimp, shallots, boy choy stems, garlic, ginger, and red pepper flakes.  Some minced water chestnut or celery for crunch.

The Fry Baby works great for them.  Just wide and deep enough.  I deep fry in lard.  Fries better, and I don't make them so often to worry about it.

A good tossed salad, 2 small bowls of Duck sauce and hot mustard, and I'm set!

I have to mention that Egg/Spring Rolls from local chinese restaurants USED to by crisp and tasty.  Now they are mostly mush.  I bet they buy them now pre-made and frozen.  So that's why I make my own.

I also make my own fried shrimp.   A local place sells good large fresh deveined shrimp.  After removing the shells, I toss them in some cornstarch, dig each in a scambled egg and then in Panko or Italian canned bread crumbs.  Fry for a couple minutes til the coating in light-to-medium tan (depends on how cooked you like your shrimp).

BTW, I have a large-mesh skoop for the fried stuff and a fine-mesh scoop to scoop out the crumbs.  Removing the crumbs keeps the Veggie Crisco or Meat Lard fresher longer.

And I use Angel Hair Spaghetti in place of Chinese Noodles. It is just easier.  And the meat in my stir fry was cubed smoked pork shoulder.

I buy one about 3x a year, cut it into 2" slabs, smoke it, and cube it.  Divide it into 4 ounce portins and set each into sandwich bags for future use.    Same with steaks.  Chicken thighs get packed whole.

An Unusual Day

It started last night.  I had been struggling to adjust to the 1.25" towing attachment on the new Subaru.  The hitch pin from a local store was too short, I had to use force, had an traier ball for a 2" hitch,  finally bought some parts on Amazon.  Yadda, yadda, yadda. 

I discovered it was simpler than it seemed and I asked Amazon if I could return some.  They said "OK", offerred me a printable return label.  Good, thank you...  But I noticed returns were free at some "Kohl" department stores.  IF I returned it today! 

So there I was playing Civ 2 (downloadable/playable to a Mac only from some Russian site (OMG!) through some iffy "portal kit").  Well, I have "best" antivirus/firewall stuff and made sure it was "up-to-date".  I checked to make sure nothing funny was going on on the Mac.  And I will offload the app to a stand-alone later today.  That was 6 am.  So I decided to stay up at a discussion board until I could do early errands.

The Kohl's store opened at 10 am.  I had things to buy at Walmart which opened at 9 am, and grocery shopping to do.

Went to Walmart and found most of the things I wanted (kitty litter, cheap store brand stuff, and "on sale" brand name items.   Got back home and put it away.

Went straight to the nearest Kohl's store.  Never been there before (and wn't be returning (their prices are way too high).  But I was relieved to see a "Amazon Returns Accepted Here" sign on the door.  Wrong door of course.  I had to haul the box of heavy metal around to the side door downhill and over a rock bed... 

On the other hand, the return was a breeze.  It was so easy, I was almost suspicious.  But they gave me a printed confirmation and a 25% purchase coupon for "today only".  Even that left the prices too high.  Hey, I'm selectively cheap.  Some things are worth spending money on, some aren't.

So I had the cheap stuff bought at Walmart put away at home, and the Amazon return done.  And I realized I was going to pass my favorite grocery store (Safeway, great produce selection).  And (not coincidentally) I had my spreadsheet grocery list in my wallet (I'll show a link to that soon but it needs updating).

So I stopped and bought groceries.  Told the produce manager their egg roll wrappers were junk.  Well, their old brand was great.  A dusting of cornstarch between each wrapper and and rolled up nicely (I like to make shrimp eggrolls sometimes) and the new brand (Wing Hing or something like that) was all crumbly and impossible to roll.

He promised to look into it (yeah, right).  I often have to help the produce guys.  Seriously, they can barely tell one apple from another.  I'm not in the "oh damn, here he comes again" reaction yet, but they do notice when I point out the labels are wrong and they are selling "Red Delicious" as "Staymans".  And I try not to bother them often. 


I smile to myself when the sales clerks ask if a head lettuce is "cabbage" or beets are "radishes.  I shouldn't because it means that they aren't familiar with fresh veggies in their own lives.  OK, come to think about it, let's say I'm more sad than smiley... 


Pushing my cart to the car, I noticed a woman poking around at the hood-up engine and mostly looking at the battery.  I put my bags in the car.


An older guy does not approach a strange woman carelessly.  There is no telling what the reaction might be.  But I went back and asked if she needed a batterry jump.  She did.  I could tell she was hesitant about a stranger asking for help.



I just recently bought a new car.  And it was partly because the battery in the 2005 Toyota wouldn't recharge well.  The dealership couldn't find the problem.  They said the batterry seemed fine and the charging system checked out OK. 

So I bought a "batterry-minder" to keep it charged in the garage, but I never was sure it would start again during errands.  So I bought a portable power-pack for emergencies.  *I* never actually needed it, but it came in handy today.    It is "the mother of all rechargeable batterries". 



In spite of having a new car, I kept it in the car.  There's room for it, and "you never know".  So I carried it to the woman's car (and noticed a scared little girl inside).  The woman was probaly afraid I would ask for money.  Nah, I'm the Boy Scout type.  Hooked up the clamps, told her to start the car, everything worked.  I told her to make sure to drive the car at least 20 minutes to recharge the battery (and maybe have it checked by a professional).  Batteries do fail.  And I wished her a good day and left.




I've gotten help from strangers before.  My first personally-purchased car once died in the dead of night in a bitterly freezing 1980 Winter on a major highway.  It was SO COLD, my roommate and I were exchanging the one good coat every 5 minutes to stay SLIGHTLY warm.  The ONE person who stopped to ask if I needed help was a Reagan conventioneer.  He asked who I supported and I said "Carter".  He smiled and not only called AAA to tow my car to a repair shop, but drove us home (way out of his way).  Good people do good things. 

Remembering that, I try to pass it on.  I could have just driven home from the Safeway store.  But how hard is it to help another?  We are all of us in this world together fighting off the cold and sadness.



So today, I was my 16 year old Boy Scout again, and did my good deed for the day.  And I thank the opportunity more than the deed...  The deed was fine, the opportunity was priceless. 

Meal Prep

I enjoy preparing and cooking food.  Slicing, chopping, peeling, etc is relaxing in a way.  I have a good set of Wusthof Classic knives and holding block that I bought from a cutlery store going out of business that was literally putting up the "Going Out Of Business" sign as I walked past.  25% of original price.

I added some individual knives later at regular price online but they weren't worth it mainly.  I find I don't really use the slightly curved "chef knives" often.  But there were 2 real gems.  The "Deli Knife" is great.  Though designed for cutting sandwiches without tearing them apart, the serrated blade and offset handle makes it easy to cut anything.
 

The Santoku knife has airpockets on the sides to reduce food sticking.

I use the Santoku for almost everything, the deli knife frequenty, and my paring knife next most. 

I use the Santoku daily, the deli knife frequently, and my 2 paring knives often (one is a mini santoku).

I have other cheaper sets, some knives of which are not bad.  And a set of Ginsu knives (they are actually decent.  Someday, I am going to built a knife block to hold them all.  The construction is not all that complicated, but it would be about 2' wide.  I would lose some counter space, but gain some drawer space.  But at least that "once in a month knife" would be easily available.

Like that "scary-as-hell-cleaver"...  I almost cut off a fingertip the first time I used it!  Sharp AND heavy with a round slippery wood handle.  What could go wrong with THAT?  I think I should reshape the handle..  It might be safe after that.  Or in case of zombies or werewolves...

But I'm not writing this about knives and prep work.  I'm writing about cooking food.  I'm not really great at it.  I forget to start the timer for simmering spaghetti while I am cutting up my salad.  Or the timer goes off and I turn of the wrong burner.  I do a lot of M/W reheating to adjust, LOL!  It all works out well enough in the end. 

I'm somewhere between the harried parent cooking boxed mac and cheese, that show "Worst Cook", and Iron chef.

Partly, I try to do too much.  When Dad was here in his last days, he said "Wow, you cook Sunday Dinner every night".  Maybe...  I got into the habit of a small amount of meat, a green veg, a red or yellow veg, sometimes a starch, and always a fancy tossed salad.  Yeah, healthy, but I like that stuff.

Dad was a "meat&potatoes guy.  I could give him a small piece of steak and a potato, and he wanted bread with it (starch city).  But he hadn't had green veggies that hadn't been boiled to death before and was a bit surprised by them.  Mom learned to cook from her Mom and she was French, so veggies were boiled within in an inch of their lives. 

The first time I ever had "Chinese Food" a whole world of veggies opened up for me.  "Chewy veggies?"  what a concept!  I learned streaming, I learned stir-frying, and later M/W all of which delivered a "crunch" to veggies.  Dad said the best meals he ever had were here.  Which did lead me to think why he hadn't learned to cook and share that duty with Mom.

But even THAT is not why I'm writing.

I'm writing because sometimes I DON'T cook.  No, not "takeout" or "delivery".  The cold plate...

This was a recent dinner when I was too tired to actually cook.  Sliced hot sausage, cubed cooked ham, cooked shrimp, chicken breast, olives, diced tomatoes, reheated potato, reheated spinach, and the small container has homemade cocktail sauce.  The glasses have Zinfandel wine and a cocktail of gin/pomegranate juice/gingerale (I call it a "Cavebear Sling").  And not a SINGLE thing I cooked that day.  LOL!



 

Forge Of Empires

'Forge Of Empires'.  The commercial was good, so I tried it.  Its free to play.  On the other hand, it is slow to develop playing free.  You can buy Diamonds (the real coin of the game), but that is sort of like paying every time you put on a pair of shoes.  The obvious commercial strategy of the developers is to sell Diamonds.

OK, let's say you are cheap (like me) and just want to build a village for free.  You can, but you are in a limited space for days (been at this 2 days on and off).  You can.  It doesn't seem to get you anywhere though.

The site offers 50 diamonds for your email address.  I think that says it all.  Can't get much anywhere in the game without them, and you can't earn then (at least at the start).  I can earn gold by the tn, but can't figure out how to spend it.

One neat positive thing is that  you can look at every building and know how long it takes for it to "produce" in real time.  Wealth weapons, culture, whatever.  I did like that part.


They want you to buy diamonds.  That's about it from their POV.

Tried 'Call To Arms'.  Same trick to sell you game-bennies.

I better get my old Windows 98 computer fixed so I can play Civilization II.  You pay for the game, but no add-on sales.  Better game too.. 

OK, I deleted Forge Of Empires...  Suckers game...

Rain

Oh damn it's raining again
I dont know when it will stop raining again.
 It just never stops raining again.

I think we're all gonna drown!

Oh my god, its raining again,
There's just no end the rain again.
How;s it possible its raining again?

I think we're all gonna drown!

"Jennifer with your orange hair
Jennifer with your green eyes
Jennifer in your dress of deepest purple
Jennifer, where are you tonight?

Underneath the water
Underneath the water
Underneath the water"

Oh man, its raining again 

Will it ever stop again?

All next week forecasts rain again.

I think we're all gonna drown!

Tadpoles

I am sometimes a bit harsh with varmints that move into my yard.  The squirrels got at my tomatoes and beans.  The groundhog eats my flowers.  The deer eat the hostas and Caladiums in the front yard.  They are NOT my loved wild animals.

There is a whole wetland and swamp and running water area across the street.  There are oak trees and stuff wild animals like to eat.  They don't need to bother me.

What they don't NEED to eat are my plants.  So I fight back a bit.  I built an entire enclose around my garden beds.  I built a tall fence 30 years ago.  The deer don't jump it.  But that doesn't stop the rabbits and groundhogs. 

The Mews take care of the rabbits.  But they can't handle a groundhog (aka woodchuck or whistle-pig).  But I can. Those normally eat lawn clover, but they sometimes decide to eat all the flowers. 

That's their end.  A hav-a-hart live cage trap is great with melon slices.  They love melons. 

I have a large tub of water that the cage fits into.   One "blub" and they go to "groundhog beyond".  If I knew a faster way, I would use it.  I hate them.  I once caught a new brood outside the den and pitchforked them!  Mom groundhog hissed at me, but I got her later.

So here is the tub.

I'm also growing aquarium plants in it.  But a frog decided to lay eggs.

Most tadpoles will not survive.  Well, think of it.  If they did, my yard would be ankle deep in frogs!  So I was curious about whether my aquarium fish would eat them (free food of high quality).

They attacked like piranha!  That was enlightening...  So I also put several into my 2 Betta tanks (one betta per tank).  One ate them and the other ignored them.  Nature is weird...

The ones in the tank where that betta didn't et them grew fast.  Betta food aggrees with them.  Today, I cleaned the tanks (monthly requirement as they have to pee in the water they live in in small tanks). 

So I netted the large tadpole in the one tank and returned them to the outdoor tub.  You wnt to know how Nature works?  They will eat their smaller siblings.  So I netted out a lot of the smaller ones.  No great favor to them.  They will be aquarium fish food.

 I watch Nature shows a lot.  Everything is eaten by something else without mercy.  Usually alive, and often ripped apart into pieces.  So I don't feel bad about feeding tadpoles to my aquarium fish or tossing a few lucky large-grown tadpoles to eat their siblings.  That's how all animals survive. 

I will have to bury the drowned groundhog though.  Otherwise the vultures find it and that IS rather gruesome.  But I bury them near specimen trees and that feeds THEM, so that is good. 

The circle of life goes on...

BTW "baby fish", once a tiny pair of eyes in the aquarium hiding in the live plants, the only survivor of a platy, is full size now.  It is my favorite for having survived all the others that wanted to eat it like a tadpole.  Some get lucky...

Random Thoughts

"EVIL":

1.  Moles and Voles are evil.
2.  Weeds are evil (poison ivy, english ivy, wild grapes, wild blackberries, invasive perennial flowers, mock strawberries, bindweed, thistles, those large plants with purple berries that stain your fingers [obviously I forget the name], and the horrid invasive vine that a previous neighbor planted and I can't find the name of either).
3.  Groundhogs are evil.
5.  Deer are evil too, but at least they are afraid to jump the backyard fence.  They just eat my front yard plants.
6.  The neighbor in the ugly McMansion across the street who mows his lawn a 7 am when I am trying to sleep is evil (even if he is a really cool guy otherwise).
7.  Both next-door neighbors are evil.  One set has a fallen over tree in the front yard and it has been sitting there for 3 years.  The other set tried to burn dry dead branches right under small dry trees and next to my wood fence.  And they didn't even have a garden hose in case things went bad (I told them to stop or I would call the fire department).  And I caught the husband using a weed whacker around my trees and shrubs 10' on my side of the property line.  "Death by weed-whacker" is an actual problem.
8.  The neighbor across the street and next to the McMansion is evil.  He and his girlfriend used to have screaming arguments at 3 am on weekends.  They moved out some years ago, but now they are back!  Who moves back to a rental place?
9.  Ryobi Tools - Its a string trimmer that won't handle grass or vines.  So I bought a replacement head with serrated plastic blades,  But I can't find the right size bolt to fit the drive shaft.  I've emailed Ryobi twice about the exact size and thread per inch, but they haven't responded.  They promised 48 hours.  Its been 5 days. As far as I can tell, it is either a 9/32nds or a 7mm reverse-threaded bolt and no one locally sells either.
10.  Neighbors 4 houses away who think that everyone within 1/2 mile wants to hear their outdoors music.

"GOOD":

1.  I have a Fall garden.  Beans, cukes, tomatoes, corn, squash, coles (brocolli, cabbage, brussel sprouts, cauliflower, kohlrabi), carrots, beets, radishes, and flat italian pole beans.
2.  Dug up some black-eyed susans in the garden paths and moved them to the meadow bed.  If they survive, great, but they had to be removed from the paths anyway.
3.  This one is a bit odd.  I plant my tomatoes through a red plastic cover.  The red cover supposedly reflects sunlight that tomatoes absorb best AND deters insects.  But it is hard to water the plants.  So years ago, I bought some plastic tubes that attach to large soda bottles.  You cut the bottoms off the bottles, sick them in the soil and you fill them with water from the hose and it slowly drips into the root zone.  Got them cleaned and installed yesterday.  Some drained quickly, others didn't.  But all drained eventually.  I'll watch the leaves to make sure they aren't wilting.  A lot faster to water the tomatoes deeply that way.
4.  The cheap electric mower is great for trim work, but only lasts 10 minutes.  Still, its quiet, and light.
5.  The cheap small electric tiller works great.  If you cut the weeds down first and till shallowly at first pass.  Otherwise, the tines get roots wrapped around them and it takes work to unwrap them.  But it is great in close situations and shallow tilling.

"ODDS":

1.  My new Subaru Forester is too fancy.  I don't understand half of the displays.  Better sit down and study the manual.  I thought it was tricky, but one of the things I noticed in the old 2005 Toyota Highlander manual as I was cleaning it out was how many post-it notes I had to things that confused me then.  So I guess I'll learn about these things on the Forester.  I especially need to learn how to NOT have the Forester shut off when stopped at traffic lights.
2.  The deck gets too hot for the cats' tender paws.  The composite deck material gets to 120F.  So I bought 3 12'x2' strips of outdoor carpet.  Turns out the Home Depot store guy gave me "a couple extra inches" on each strip.  None of which are exactly the same width.  So I have to do some extra cutting.
3.  Related to the above, I think I will get a cover over half the deck.  I would get a retractable Sunsetter awning, but my deck-to-roof distance is too low.  I would cover the whole deck, but I have smoker/griller on one end and that needs free "up-space" for the heat and smoke.

That's almost enough, but I came across a funny thing all writers will understand...

STEPS FOR CURING WRITER'S BLOCK:

1.   

LOL!

Tree Pictures

OK, sometimes I don't post as many pictures here as I do at Mark's Mews.  Cats are more photogenic.  And sometimes trees are just "trees".   But pictures do liven up mere words, and when I mention particular trees, I should show them. 

Part of it is that I don't always have the camera with me outside when I SUDDENLY get it into my mind to do something.  And sometimes I am mostly done with a project and think "why didn't I take pictures?" and then it is too late.  And, given how badly I type (I do a LOT of editing), I should take advantage of the fact that you can't misspell a picture...  LOL!

So here are some tree pictures...

First "Helen's Holly".  It was hard to find an angle where the holly stood out any from the background trees.  This was the best.  The lowest leaves are 6' above ground, so it looks to be about 15" high now and about 20 years transplanted here from 3'.

This is a row of prunings from the holly and a few other trees.  I gather the prunings in  piles I can pick up easily later to load onto the trailer.  The trailer is full of one set of prunings, and there are more in the back yard.  Easily 3 trailer-loads.

This is the front yard Saucer Magnolia showing (as best I can) the twisted branches I am trying to establish.

Hope this helps...